


T Is For Tea On Trains

by mydogwatson



Series: A Baker Street Alphabet [20]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: M/M, Marriage, Tea, probably a bit fluffy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-05
Updated: 2013-11-05
Packaged: 2017-12-31 15:04:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,420
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1033094
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mydogwatson/pseuds/mydogwatson
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Through the years there has been a lot of tea and a lot of train travel.</p>
            </blockquote>





	T Is For Tea On Trains

**Author's Note:**

> Maybe it's time to say thanks again to all of you for reading my stories, leaving kudos, and commenting.

What would the world do without tea?  
How did it exist?  
I’m glad I was not born before tea!  
-Sydney Smith

 

1

As a general rule, John Watson enjoyed travelling by train. At its best, a rail journey could be quite relaxing, a chance to just sit back and watch the landscape go by. No fuss, no worry, no bloody security lines. An easy way from point A to point B.

However, as with so much else in his life, that all changed dramatically with the arrival of Sherlock Holmes.

He realised on their very first train trip together, a journey from London to St. Ives for a case, that what had generally been a pleasure would now be classified as another circle of Holmesian hell. Part of the misery was down to the fact that the police [for which read Lestrade] had refused, with considerable indignation, to fund a first class trip, so here they were in standard class with the general population. John thought that Lestrade should have known that no good could ever come of such an arrangement.

The only saving grace, small as it was, lay in the fact that the train was not terribly crowded, so they had a table and four seats to themselves. The alternative didn’t really bear thinking of.

He should not have been surprised that Sherlock’s idea of entertainment on a long rail journey was deducing everyone in the vicinity and not in a quiet voice either.

“Well, she shouldn’t actually be surprised, should she, John? After sleeping with her brother-in-law for ten years, how did she expect her sister to react?”

A plump woman in purple polyester fled from the carriage, her face dangerously red. A vermillion shade that clashed rather badly with the shiny purple.

“Shut up, Sherlock,” John muttered. “You’re going to get us thrown out onto the tracks.”

Sherlock huffed.  
John tried desperately to come with a safe distraction, but the best that came to mind was the sturdy British standby. “I’ll go get us some tea, shall I?” Yes, good idea. “I’ll just nip along to the café car. Won’t take me more than two minutes, I’m sure. You just stay here and---” John fixed him with a stony gaze. “---no deducing.”

That got him two raised brows. “Might as well say no breathing,” Sherlock muttered.

“Also an option,” John warned as he set off for the café car.

When he returned ten minutes later [there had been a queue, that other sturdy British standby], the carriage was distinctly unbalanced, with Sherlock still where he’d been at one end, and everybody else crowded at the other. There was considerable muttering going on at both ends of the space.

John set the two cardboard cups down on the table, along with a packet of chocolate biscuits. “Charmed them all, I see,” he said, not giving into the urge to laugh. It took real effort.

Sherlock just looked smug. Then he took a sip of the tea. An expression of pure horror appeared on his face. “My god!” he nearly shouted. “This is dreadful. Is this even tea? John, how could you bring me this?” He sounded deeply and personally injured.

John shrugged and opened the biscuit package. “It’s what you get on a train, Sherlock.”

“But you always bring me good tea. I like your tea.”

Ridiculously, John felt vaguely warmed by the unexpected praise. “Thank you.”

Sherlock just shook his head sadly. “You should never bring me tea like this, John.”

John sighed. “All right,” he said. “I will never bring you bad tea again.”

Sherlock was back to smugness. “I’ll have a biscuit, though,” he said, snatching the packet.

John was glad he’d had one biscuit already, because the chances of getting another were slim. But at least he would have two cups of tea.

*

2

Although he would not accept it [or, at least, admit it aloud] for quite a long time [after many cases, missed opportunities, then “dying” and being reborn] when he finally did think about the matter, Sherlock thought he could pinpoint the exact moment he realised that he was in love with John Watson.

It happened on their second train journey, a trip to Edinburgh on a case for Mycroft. This time they were in first class, but the upgrade did not cheer Sherlock much. When he started talking about the man in the pinstripe suit two rows up [“Embezzlement, John, to pay for his mistress, who has very expensive tastes---”] the situation began to look dangerous.

“Shut up,” John hissed. “How about some tea?”

Sherlock gave him a dark look. “We are on a train, John. You promised me no more train tea.”

John just smiled. He reached into his overnight bag and took out a shiny silver flask and two cups. “I brought tea from home,” he said. “To spare you the horror of the National Rail brew.”

Sherlock beamed at him in his //John is almost a genius// way.

And much later, when he was brave enough to think about it, Sherlock would decide that this was the moment he accepted being [secretly and rather hopelessly] in love.

*

3

John had no real idea why he was even on the damned train. He had absolutely no desire to go to York to see his sister and her new Significant Other. He’d only agreed to do so because…well, he couldn’t really remember why he’d agreed, except that Harry had cried and made him feel guilty. As much as he felt anything these days, which wasn’t much at all.

Mrs. Hudson thought it was a good idea, of course. “You need to get out and about a bit, John,” she said.

That sounded very much like what everybody used to tell him, before he just stopped seeing people. “Time to move on, John, don’t you think?” It was phrased more or less diplomatically, but the message was always the same.

John was watching the rain hit the train window. He was glad for the grey weather, as it suited his mood.

He didn’t understand why no one could understand that there was no moving on from this. Not that he even wanted to. Moving on was just a way for Sherlock to die all over again.

He still missed Sherlock as much as he had from day one. It just never got better.

Yet here he was on a train to York.

He realised that the refreshment trolley was rattling up the aisle and so he decided to have a cuppa. It was rather an automatic decision, after all, because he was British, the trolley was coming, and so, of course, he would have tea. A very ordinary thing to do.

So it was a bit of a surprise that when he took the first sip of the tea, he felt the tears sliding down his face.

It was less of a surprise that when he reached the York train station, he only checked the board, then climbed the stairs to cross the tracks and get on the next train back to London.

*

4

The ancient train carriage crept along the mountainside, seeming always to be just on the edge of sliding back to the canyon below. The five carriages were all packed with farmers, ducks, chickens, and even a pig or two. The noise was unbearable and so was the stench.

Sherlock Holmes, clad in tattered trousers and wrapped in a filthy cotton jacket, sat pressed into one corner. His curls had been chopped off and the hair was temporarily red. He was numb with exhaustion, despair, and something that he would not call loneliness.

Someone spoke to him in a language that he did actually know, but which he momentarily struggled to understand. But the simplest thing to do was nod, so he did and a moment later he was handed a battered tin mug, which he wrapped his fingers around, grateful for the warmth. Then he took a sip of what proved to be strong and very bitter tea.  
Sherlock closed his eyes and let the homesickness wash across him,the wave of emotion almost drowning him where he sat.

Once he was off this train, he decided, he would not drink tea anymore. He would have only coffee until he could once again have a cup of properly made tea. Properly made tea that he would drink sitting in his Baker Street flat. Tea that John made for him.

He rested the tin mug on his knees and tried not to think about anything but the next man he intended to kill.

*

5

It was so unbelievable as to be almost funny.

A: John Watson had never even imagined that he would one day be honeymooning on the Orient Express. And B: he had certainly never imagined that he’d be honeymooning with Sherlock Holmes.

[Well, all right, to be perfectly honest, while the specific idea of a honeymoon had never been part of his fantasies, some of the, uh, activities of such an occasion had figured in his thoughts, a long time before he had any reason to think such dreams would become reality.]

And while Sherlock might disdain calling it one, here they were, honeymooning on the bleeding Orient Express. A courtesy, although it was never mentioned, of Mycroft Holmes.

John could not stop grinning.

“Maybe there’ll be a murder,” he said as they made their way to the dining car for breakfast. He wondered if the people they were passing could tell how thoroughly shagged out he and Sherlock were. He couldn’t decide if he hoped all those other passengers would be able to look at them and think something like // Lord, those two have been shagging a lot!// or not. On the whole, he thought yes. He also realised that their next thought would undoubtedly be: Why is it that rather short, extremely plain fellow shagging a GQ model?

He grinned. //Because he’s my bloody husband!//

“Why would there be a murder?” Sherlock asked. He kept brushing against John, apparently trying to decide whether or not it would be appropriate to take his hand.  
“You know, Murder on the Orient Express,” John replied. Tired of Sherlock’s tentative approaches, he just grabbed the other man’s hand and entwined their fingers.

“Well, yes, if there were to be a murder it would, of course, be a murder on the Orient Express, but---”

They had reached the dining car.

“Never mind,” John said. “Not important.”

They were seated immediately. “Tea,” John said cheerfully to the hovering waiter. “Lots of tea.”

Sherlock glared at him.

John leaned over the table. “I think we’ll be okay with this tea, Sherlock. Luxury train, real china cups, gourmet chef. I doubt that a decent cuppa is beyond their capabilities.”

When the tea had been served, Sherlock took a careful, tentative sip. After a moment, he nodded. “Satisfactory,” he pronounced.

“I told you.”

Then Sherlock reached out and lightly touched the gleaming new ring on John’s finger. “Satisfactory,” he repeated. “But still not as good as the tea you make, John. That’s my favorite.”

“”Quite right,” John said.

So. A honeymoon on the Orient Express. With Sherlock bloody Holmes. And a satisfactory cup of morning tea.

His life was so perfect that it was definitely funny.

*

6

They treated themselves to first class travel, as this was a rather momentous occasion. John was a little unsure of exactly how to be acting. Sherlock had been quiet [well, even more quiet than usual] and solemn for the past week as they finished packing up everything in Baker Street for shipment to Sussex. The house was sold and the new owners were eager to get in and begin their extensive renovations. The only time John had seen him smile in days was when Sherlock carefully removed the tattered copy of Rules For A Happy Marriage from the kitchen wall where they had hung for so many years. “Do we still need those?” John asked when he saw his husband tucking the paper carefully into a box.

Sherlock had only shrugged. “Wouldn’t want to mess things up at this late date, would we?”

Now Sherlock and he were on a train taking them to Sussex, away from London, and the life they had lived there for so long.

Sherlock stretched his legs to their full length and stared out the window.

John pretended to be engaged in his book [not that he really thought he was fooling his husband], but spent most of his time studying Sherlock. Time had made changes, of course. The once-dark curls were now more silver than anything else, though still thick and wild. There were more lines around his incomparable eyes and around the mouth that still tossed out both wisdom and sarcasm with lightning speed. With it all, Sherlock Holmes was still a striking man who would be noticed in any crowd.

There were times even now, after almost thirty years of marriage, when John still marveled that the mad genius, a man who could have had anyone in the world, had chosen and loved ordinary John Watson.

He realised that Sherlock was watching him in the reflection of the window.

They exchanged a brief smile.

John reached into his bag and took out an extremely battered silver flask and two cups. “Tea?”

Sherlock shifted in the seat so that he was looking at John.   
“Of course.”

John poured and they drank in silence for a few moments.

“Thank you,” Sherlock said finally.

“No problem.”

“I was not talking about the tea, John.”

“Oh?” 

“I am thanking you for the life we have had.”

John took a moment to steady his voice before he spoke. “It’s not over yet,” he chastised gently.

“One part of it is.”

“I’m looking forward to the next part,” John said.

“As am I.”

They had plans. The bees, of course. John wanted to write up the rest of the cases. Most of all, they were both looking forward to more time together, without the press of work and London. But he thought Sherlock would feel the change more keenly. “Are you…” His words dwindled off. He had been going to say ‘sad’, but he knew how Sherlock would react to that.

Sherlock sipped more tea. Then he stared into John’s eyes. “I am content,” he said, his voice a silken rumble.

John said nothing as he unscrewed the top of the flask and filled their cups one more time.

fini


End file.
